Idaho semi-weekly world. [volume] (Idaho City, Idaho Territory) 1875-1908, 1887-09-16
IDAHO
AMERICAN DIALECTS.
The Advisability of Establishing a Society
for Their Preservation.

for Their Preservation.
IL 1t possible to establish such an in.
stitutionP II is certainly time. Year
after year the older districts of the
United States and Canada are getting
less and less distinguished by those PEE
culiarities in their vernacular which tc
the student Of history and philology
are of the utmost interest. Public
schools, many newspapers, cheap books,
a taste for reading, notion that 'old.
time" ways and dialect are not ''ele
CANT" and, above all, the more con-
slant communication between different
paTts of the country, are doing much to
tone down the people Of the United
States to what. from the philologist's
point Of view, Is one dead level. In
time the mountainecrs Of Tennessee
and the hill country Of the Carolinas,
the "crackers" Of Georgia and the pic
turesquely talking folk Of the Arkansas
bottoms and the lower Mississippi will
have lost many Of their present pcculi-
aritics OF speech. Even the New Eng
landers, am told Qor have not lived
in America for more than twenty years.
are fast abandoning many Of those dia-
lectic peculiarities which TO Il philolo-
gist are 50 suggestive. Even the Viz
ginians, since they have gone into the
great world. are no longer SO readily
"berayed" by their speech. Now.
therefore. Is the time to collect vocabu-
laries Of these local dialects. with spec
linens cleaned from public works illus
trating the use Of any particular word.
Books, alnianacs, clcction-addresses
and host Of similar ephemcral liter
ature might be gathered and deposited
IN the national library. Mr.. Cable.
by his novels. has done much to
preserve the quaint Creole Louisiana
speech; Mr.. Johnston has in the same
way done ~ much for the Georgian
dialect; Miss Mnrfree for the Tennessee
monntaincers; Mr.. Page for the Virgin
fans; host Of writers, inprimis Mr..
Lowell, for the New Englanders; and,
not TO go over the long roll Of writers
in American dialects. Mr.. Harris has
shown US what wealth Of folklore
and folk-speech there is 10 be garnered
among the Southern negroes. But the
next generation will have no such easy
task Ms the present one. Even III slow
going England the Folklore Society
and the English Dialect Society came
quite late enough into the fold. and
found that in "a few years more the
school boards aud the desire to be
ssgcntecl'' would have efiectually
eifaced those old-world differences OF
tongue which even in 1898. when Put
tenham was writing his carte of Eng
fish posie,n had begun TO be blurred.
Already many a precious relic Of the
past has been forever lost, and we can
only be thankful that so much has been
preserved. In America q speak. OF
course, OF the old colonial sections( there
still linger peculiarities, and even bits
Of folklore, which have vanished out Of
the districts in the mother-countrios
from which the immigrants came.
Now, therefore. IL the time for snatch
ing up what still remains, and ques-
ton whether there arenot in the United
States and In lower Canada quite a
many dialects as there ARE IN England.
The Pennsylvania Dutchman. has
even yet peculiarties in speech casl,
detected by those who know them and
there is scarcely nm old State OF the
Union Of which the same could not be
said. ~ Cor. Science.